Portuguese Desserts

Portuguese desserts, usually quite sweet and high in egg content, have never been a nightly habit. But bring on a special occasion or holiday, and you can find the dessert table over laden with puddings of rice, custard, meringue, platters of cookies and cakes and of course sweet bread, some will call “massa sovada” and others “pão doce”. Usually the flavoring consists of grated lemon peel or orange peel and of course cinnamon. Today you will find some cooks using vanilla more frequently. Cookies are typically brushed with beaten egg wash. They aren’t usually fancy but they’re the perfect match with hot tea or coffee. Modern versions are including the use of baking powder in recipes that previously relied solely on a beaten quantity of eggs for leavening. Eggs are separated, yolks incorporated into the batter and the stiffly beaten whites are folded in the batter before pouring into the prepared cake pan.

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Azevias de Grao (Chickpea Pastry)

Did I mention our love of Azevias de Grao (chickpea turnovers)?  We love chickpeas. Seriously, you can see we even use them in desserts. The name Azevia indicates a type of flounder to which these pastries are somewhat shaped when folded over.…

CHOCOLATE FILLED JESUITA PASTRIES

Chocolate Filled Jesuita Pastries, a flaky puff pastry with a slight crunch of almonds, is my contemporary variation of Jesuitas.  Inspired by a recent trip to the town of Guimarães, the first capital of Portugal, I created this version for…

Orange Squares (Quadradas de Laranja)

  Orange Squares, (Quadradas de Laranja) as they are known, is a simple cake without icings. It is just what we need to satisfy the taste buds.  So easy to make, these Orange Squares (Quadradas de Laranja) have a post-baked infusion…
COCONUT FLAN /BOLO DE COCO
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Coconut Flan (Bolo de Coco)

     Literally translated, this Coconut Flan (Bolo de Coco) is Coconut Cake, but it is really of a flan consistency. Using the whites to starch their habits, nuns created luscious desserts with the yolks and sweetened with sugar. …
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Chocolate Filled Jesuita Pastries

Chocolate Filled Jesuita Pastries, a  flaky, chocolaty puff pastry with a slight crunch of almonds, is my contemporary variation of Jesuitas I created from  inspiration on a recent trip to the town of  Guimarães in northern Portugal.  Although…